PHARMACEUTICALS, GUNS, & GOVERNMENT = PEOPLE BANS
by Dr. Paul Gallant and Dr. Joanne D. Eisen
Dillon Precision’s Blue Press, January 2009
In Nassau County, New York, a revised handgun application went into effect in January 2007. A new question asks: “Have you used or still use narcotics, tranquilizers or anti depressant [sic] medication? If YES, record doctor's name, address and phone number, (attach).” If the applicant answers in the affirmative, a list of those medications is also required.
The new question may have been added as a means of increasing public safety, but Nassau County licensees have maintained a nearly spotless record in this area. A more likely explanation is that this could be the next practical step in denying exercise of the Second Amendment.
The recent Heller Supreme Court decision gave gun-owners a tripartite victory: firearm possession is an individual right, a complete ban on firearms is unconstitutional, and the right to self-defense with firearms is affirmed. The Supreme Court nevertheless left plenty of wiggle room for the firearm-prohibitionists, by allowing for “reasonable regulation.”
“Reasonable” is a very big word, and it opens the way to the eradication of our rights. If firearms can no longer be banned, then expanding the list of prohibited persons is the next tactic for firearm-hostile politicians to explore. That subjective factor of “reasonable” regulation could cast an extremely wide net.
Alan Chwick, a Nassau County Second Amendment activist and Managing Coach at the Freeport Junior Club, first advised us of the handgun application change. He also told us that “Richard Aborn, formerly of Handgun Control, Inc., was recently appointed Assistant District Attorney for the county, and has been providing advice to Nassau County officials,” who are, themselves, notoriously firearm-hostile.
Firearm-prohibitionists like Aborn are experts in the use of fear-mongering to further their agenda. And that fear is being exploited in Nassau County today, by using classes of drugs as markers for determining potentially violent people, and by inappropriately substituting prescription data for violent personal histories.
There is no scientific evidence to suggest that a history of legal drug use is a valid disqualifier of firearm ownership. According to the best criminological evidence, the most accurate predictor of violent behavior is a past history of violence.
The Nassau County Police Department (NCPD) acts as the county’s handgun licensing authority; licenses issued in Nassau County are valid for 5 years, after which time they must be renewed. If licensing authorities are allowed to determine that some drugs should be firearm “disqualifiers,” and others not, we will soon discover that there is no line between which drugs are dangerous, and which are not.
The new question has the potential to destroy the right of millions of Americans to use and possess firearms for self-defense. And it can damage the long standing ethical code of doctor-patient confidentiality.
Tranquilizers and Narcotics as Handgun Disqualifiers
Tranquilizers are generally intended to calm people. Narcotics are used for pain management. Although both classes of drugs can impair the user, there is no evidence to which the NCPD can point that gun-owners using such legally prescribed drugs represent a threat to society.
But the NCPD can use your physician to add you to the prohibited persons list, by calling him or her and asking for his or her opinion about your qualifications to possess a handgun. Because it is never possible to predict with certainty how any one person will react, most prescribers will be intimidated by the potential legal ramifications of the information they give to the NCPD.
And if more than one doctor prescribed any of those medications, it might only take one of them to deny you your rights.
Public policy regarding drunk-driving prohibition is not nearly so stringent, despite ample evidence that alcohol consumption prior to driving does represent a significant threat to society. According to the CDC, in 2005, alcohol-related accidental fatalities accounted for 16,885 deaths—or a whopping 41% of all accidental traffic fatalities, nationwide. This figure is far greater than the total number of all firearm-related felonious homicides (12,121) and accidental firearm-related deaths during (810) that same year.
Reliable and affordable ignition interlock devices, which prevent motor vehicle use if the driver is intoxicated, are readily available. But there is no unrelenting call for retrofitting all motor vehicles with such a device. In fact, there is no call at all.
That measure would be more practical and more Constitution-friendly than constant attempts to so strictly limit civilian firearm possession, that guns are, in fact, banned. It does not appear that the intent of the NCPD’s handgun policy is public safety. Rather, it would seem that creating confiscatory gun regulation is paramount.
Anti-Depressants as Handgun Disqualifiers
Use of anti-depressants has been linked to youngsters who have gone on high-profile, but rare, mass-shooting sprees. If these drugs can cause people to suddenly “snap,” it might seem reasonable to restrict legal possession of firearms to those taking such drugs as an effective strategy to prevent violent rampages. One point on which most researchers agree is that these incidents generally occur in a susceptible group of individuals under 25 years of age.
But because locks are easily disabled, in order to prevent any access to firearms by this class of individuals, or any other susceptible group, our society would need to tightly restrict the possession and storage of all weapons—exactly the goal of the firearm-prohibitionists.
Disarming the country in order to prevent that rare mass murder by firearm, or suicide by firearm, remains an impossible task, because even such a massive, wholesale infringement on the Second Amendment rights of Americans would not prevent access to weapons: guns will always be available.
In New York City, it is easy for anyone—store-owner, or felon fresh out of jail—to quickly and cheaply acquire his gun of choice on the flourishing black market. Anti-gun politicians like Mayor Michael Bloomberg know it. And so does the NCPD.
In all practicality, we would need to choose between the ready accessibility of guns for self-defense, or the false premise of total inaccessibility of guns that can be snatched for committing that rare mass murder.
Which would make for a safer society?
John Lott and William Landes, in their paper, “Multiple Victim Public Shootings, Bombings, and Right-To-Carry Concealed Handgun Laws,” found that even criminally irrational individuals might not act if their expected outcome—multiple mass-murder—might be averted or reduced by an armed bystander. They found that, in jurisdictions where handgun licenses are easily obtained, “the drop in murders and injuries is surprisingly large.”
Another group of anti-gun researchers, led by Grant Duwe, also investigated the issue of mass-public shootings, using different data, and applying different statistical methods. In their paper, “The Impact of Right-to Carry Concealed Firearm Laws on Mass Public Shootings,” Duwe and his co-authors found “little evidence that RTC laws increase or reduce the number of mass public shootings….”
That statement negates the Lott/Landes positive finding of reduced violence, but does not contradict it. No matter what data Duwe and his team chose to use, and no matter how they treated that data, their conclusion could not support the argument that greater safety would follow from more restrictive gun laws.
Banning Everyone
If we allow fear mongering to replace good science and sound medical care, we can make the case that most drugs Americans commonly take could be used as firearm disqualifiers. That is because virtually all drugs—prescription and over-the-counter—have been associated with psychological and neurological adverse effects.
We must also fear any gun-owner, or non-gun-owner, who is taking other drugs—drugs not intended to change one’s mental functioning, but to heal one’s body. Drugs used to treat hypertension, high cholesterol and erectile dysfunction are among those that could be used to expand the list of prohibited persons.
Aleve is a popular over-the-counter drug used to treat a variety of painful conditions. Among its potential side effects are drowsiness, problems with vision or balance, vertigo, depression, cognitive dysfunction, and convulsions.
In order to protect society from the potential of dizzy, depressed, impaired people carrying handguns, when can we expect the NCPD to add Aleve to its list of potential drug disqualifiers?
The NCPD’s use of drugs as disqualifying markers amounts to an end-run around the Supreme Court’s decision against gun bans. And if the NCPD is successful in its implementation of this new policy, we expect it will soon be seized upon and widely implemented in other jurisdictions for the purpose of expanding the list of prohibited persons.
No gun bans. Just people bans.
